BBC Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Serious' Infringement of Broadcasting Regulations, Declares Ofcom
The British broadcaster engaged in a "major breach" of media regulations by failing to disclose that the presenter of a film about the Gaza situation was the offspring of a Hamas official, as determined by regulatory body Ofcom.
An inquiry by Ofcom into Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has determined that the film was "materially misleading".
The chief executive of the broadcaster had previously apologised, saying there had been "a serious error in relation to truthfulness".
The regulator has instructed the broadcaster to air a prime-time declaration about its conclusions.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our rules, we are directing the BBC to air a statement of our conclusions against it on BBC Two at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be determined," the statement read.
'Risk to Damage Trust'
The authority's announcement said: "Our investigation concluded that the programme's lack of disclosure that the voice's male guardian held a role in the Hamas-administered administration was significantly deceptive.
"This implied that the audience did not have vital facts which may have been highly relevant to their assessment of the presenter and the details he presented.
"Credibility is at the center of the bond between a television network and its public, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the BBC.
"This error had the risk to erode the significantly high amounts of trust that the public would have placed in a documentary produced by the BBC about the Israel-Gaza war."
The documentary was removed from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the boy's familial connections came to light, and in July an broadcaster's internal assessment found it violated the organization's journalistic standards on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The regulator's decision is in line with the conclusions of the internal assessment, that there was a serious error in the film in relation to the corporation's content standards on factual correctness, which corresponds to regulation 2.2 of the regulator's media standards.
"We issued an apology for this and we agree with Ofcom's decision in complete. We will comply with the penalty as soon as the timing and wording are confirmed."